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FOREWORD

The information contained in this Foreword is not part of this American National Standard (ANS) and has not been processed in accordance with ANSI's requirements for an ANS. As such, this Foreword may contain material that has not been subjected to public review or a consensus process. In addition, it does not contain requirements necessary for conformance to the Standard.

The Alliance for Telecommunication Industry Solutions (ATIS) serves the public through improved understanding between carriers, customers, and manufacturers. The Packet Technologies and Systems Committee (PTSC) -- formerly T1S1 -- develops and recommends standards and technical reports related to services, architectures, and signaling, in addition to related subjects under consideration in other North American and international standards bodies. PTSC coordinates and develops standards and technical reports relevant to telecommunications networks in the U.S., reviews and prepares contributions on such matters for submission to U.S. ITU-T and U.S. ITU-R Study Groups or other standards organizations, and reviews for acceptability or per contra the positions of other countries in related standards development and takes or recommends appropriate actions.

ANSI guidelines specify two categories of requirements: mandatory and recommendation. The mandatory requirements are designated by the word shall and recommendations by the word should. Where both a mandatory requirement and a recommendation are specified for the same criterion, the recommendation represents a goal currently identifiable as having distinct compatibility or performance advantages.

Suggestions for improvement of this document are welcome. They should be sent to the Alliance for Telecommunications Industry Solutions, PTSC Secretariat, 1200 G Street NW, Suite 500, Washington, DC 20005.

The Signaling, Architecture, and Control (SAC) Subcommittee was responsible for the development of this document.